AD said:
WC1 remake? it's been done before. It's called super wing commander. And yes there is some controversy regarding some of the "changes" therein. (ive never played swc so I can't comment on this)
Having played SWC for several hours yesterday, here's what I have to say on the controversy over it:
The remake could have easily eclipsed the original *if* they had taken their new features to their proper conclusion. SWC had it all: FMV, cool looking cockpits that shifted as you moved (like Prophecy!), higher resolution ships, more up to date drawings, voice acting, ITTS tracking, an enemy direction indicator, and the list goes on. All while maintaining much of the feel of the original game. However, if you take apart each of these features, you find that each one falls short of what it could be, and even detracts from the original! Here's a quick list of items I can think of now:
- The voice acting is awful. Such flat lines delivered from people who are obviously non-professionals. Halycon is particularly bad, despite the fact that he's one of the few that doesn't have a (very) faked accent. With professional voice actors, this would have been much better. (Chris would argue that at the time we were happy to hear anything. I would argue that Privateer did a far better job the year earlier, and that WCIII was released the same year.)
- The cockpit indicators are useless. The radar is so small that it's impossible to get *good* bearings on the enemy craft. In fact, it's quite difficult to see the dots on the screen at all! Thankfully, they have an arrow in the targeting reticle that tells you which way to turn, but it's not a replacement for a good radar. Same with the shield, armor, and damage readouts. They've all been simplified into a picture of your ship that turns red in the area it's damaged. It's nice looking, but difficult to extract useful information from in a combat situation. Damage readouts have been replaced with a single floating line that loops through each damaged component. So much for getting a quick summary of your condition.
- The ITTS always overestimates the lead, especially when there is none. This is quite annoying as I've been trained from WCII on to aim for the ITTS reticle. Now I have to unlearn that behavior.
- The wingmen are dumber than rocks falling into a canyon. I swear, if I let them off my wing for ONE second, the bastards fly right into my line of fire and get their asses toasted by friendly fire! Gah! Can't they pick an enemy and stick with him instead of flying in front of me?! (Ok, so this is a minor nitpick, but it annoys me to no end.)
- Because of the FMV, your chance to check the state of your fighter after a mission is lost. It's replaced with the deck chief saying something non-helpful like, "You're lucky to have made it back" or "Glad to have you back, sir!". *sigh*
In short, SWC strikes me as an excellent project done on a low budget in a short amount of time. If they had taken the time to fix these shortcomings, it would be one of the most sought after items today. If a WC1 remake ever occurs, the best thing for them to do is to get the original gameplay down pat, then add features such as voice acting *very slowly* so as to ensure that they're done right. If the feature isn't working, throw it out!